Page:The elements of Welsh grammar.djvu/9

 PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. In compiling this little book I have tried to give prominence, by rule and example, to the first elements of Welsh Grammar. All details have been carefully excluded, except where they were thought to illustrate some important point in the language. I hope the book will be of service to three classes of students : (1) Those boys and girls of our County Schools who are taking up Welsh for the Junior Certificate of the Central Welsh Board ; (2) Welsh-speaking Queen's Scholarship Candidates, of whom it is to be hoped an ever-increasing number will take up Welsh as their optional language ; and (3) Englishmen who desire to acquire some knowledge of Welsh without having to master at the very threshold a mass of detail, which is more confusing than helpful, and which only serves to discourage those who might otherwise soon master the language. I have sought to illustrate all rules by means of suitable examples drawn from the classics of Welsh literature. Rules without ex- amples are rarely understood even by advanced students. For junior pupils they are absolutely meaningless. The pupil who works through this little Grammar conscientiously, will no doubt be able to enter with profit upon a study of Prof. Anwyl's two scholarly volumes on the same subject in the Parallel Grammar Series. My thanks are due to W. Jenkyn Jones, Esq., B.A., Lecturer in Mental and Moral Science at the University College, Aberystwyth, for kindly reading through the proof-sheets, and giving me the benefit of his advice. SAMUEL J. EVANS. Llangefni County School, Anglesey, Oct., 1899. 2209933